


baby, I hate days like this

by TardisIsTheOnlyWayToTravel



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Cap2 spoilers, Chitauri invasion, M/M, The Winter Soldier - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-17
Updated: 2014-04-17
Packaged: 2018-01-19 17:21:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1477831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TardisIsTheOnlyWayToTravel/pseuds/TardisIsTheOnlyWayToTravel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>During the events of <i>The Avengers</i>, the Winter Soldier is sent to kill Loki. Things do not go as planned.</p><p>[Spoilers for Captain America: Winter Soldier]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've written some Cap2 gen fic already, so here, have some Steve/Bucky.

The Winter Soldier sits, waiting obediently, as his two handlers argue about whether or not he should be sent after his potential target.

“It’s one man,” argues the first handler. “SHIELD resources are surely enough for–”

“We are talking about an _alien_ ,” snaps the second handler furiously, “from a technologically advanced culture, with unknown abilities and resources, who apparently has the ability to subvert anyone he likes with a touch of that spear of his–”

The dossier is sitting on the table in front of him, and when the handlers keep arguing instead of giving him orders, the Winter Soldier opens it. There’s a photo of a pale man with sharp eyes and a knife-like smile, holding a glowing spear, and beneath that, a report on the potential target and his capabilities. The potential target’s name is Loki, and he is apparently an alien. The Winter Soldier absorbs this without judgement.

The Winter Soldier is aware of the exact moment that silence falls, as the two handlers look at him and realise that he is reading the file. There’s a moment where nothing happens. He continues reading.

“Fine,” says the first handler sullenly. “It’s your decision. But for the record–”

“I think you’ve already stated what your opinion is just fine,” the second handler smoothly interjects.

The Winter Soldier tunes out their argument without ever losing awareness of what is going on. He’s not that stupid.

* * *

His handlers track the target to a certain geographical area, and the Winter Soldier is sent out on his mission: to terminate the target as soon as possible, and recover the spear he wields.

It isn’t really that hard to find where the target is hiding, not for him: The Winter Soldier has a certain reputation, and as soon as the Winter Soldier appears demanding information, all kinds of intel is made available by whoever he asks. There are unusual thefts and purchases being made, along with the acquisition of weapons and ammunition, and those are traceable.

Finding the target is easy. Actually eliminating him is more of a challenge.

The Winter Soldier infiltrates the target’s makeshift base, sticking to the shadows and avoiding attention. He waits until the target is alone, and then leaps, knife in hand.

But somehow the target is ready for him, whirling to block his strike with the spear he carries. The Winter Soldier is fast, and his cybernetic arm wields more force than an organic arm, but somehow the target is both stronger and faster. There is a ferocious fight which only ends when the target hits the Winter Soldier with strength no man should possess, and sends him flying. Before the Winter Soldier can move, the target’s spear is pressed to his chest. He waits for agony and death, but nothing happens.

“You have no heart,” says the target, frowning at him. “This must be rectified.” He taps the end of the spear to the Winter Soldier’s forehead.

The Winter Soldier collapses to the ground with a scream as he is overwhelmed with memories, his programming creaking and fracturing under the strain. The newer memories are first, of missions and death and being wiped over and over again. These memories go on for a very long time, until suddenly all he knows is pain and confusion and impassive faces, and then he’s _falling_. The memories after that are more pleasant – or should be, except that in their own way they are far more horrifying, because they tell him who he is and how far he’s fallen.

When it’s all over he lies sobbing on the floor, and the target is looking down at him like he’s a particularly interesting scientific experiment. He knows what that expression looks like all too well.

“Interesting,” remarks the target. “What is your name?”

He’s no longer the Winter Soldier: his programming has fractured, and what is left behind is not the Winter Soldier anymore. But he’s not Bucky Barnes anymore, either – not after everything he’s been through. But the answer to the target’s question in unexpectedly important.

“James,” he settles on, his voice hoarse and raw from screaming. The target smiles.

“Well, James,” and the spear dips down to rest over his heart, “I am sure that I will find a use for you.”

* * *

James finds himself working with a man named Barton as they put together a plan for assaulting the SHIELD helicarrier. Halfway through James flicks his hair out of his face, frustrated with its length, and Barton suddenly goes wide-eyed.

“Holy shit, you’re Bucky Barnes!” he exclaims.

James gives him a stare which fully conveys what he thinks of Barton’s observation.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Barton defends himself, “I can’t help knowing who you are, I work with Agent Coulson, he’s a Captain America nut –”

James glares. Somewhere underneath his focused devotion to Loki, thoughts of Steve ache like a throbbing tooth. He doesn’t appreciate the reminder.

“Shut up about Captain America,” he rasps, and the deadly look he shoots Barton’s way makes the other man look suddenly wary.

After a moment Barton goes back to talking about the planned assault, as though he hadn’t said anything about Captain America, and James goes back to concentrating on plans and objectives.

(The memory of Steve still goddamn hurts, though.)

* * *

He and Barton lead the attack on the carrier. Barton has his own mission: James’ mission is to retrieve the spear that Loki uses. Undoubtedly it would have been taken from him by SHIELD, and most likely put aside for study. So, following the helicarrier blueprints he looked at earlier (thanks to Barton), James heads for the labs. A group of Loki’s soldiers surrounds him, ready to gun down anyone who gets in his way.

They find the spear in a lab that’s been half-destroyed by their attack, and James picks it up. Whispers flicker around the edges of his mind in languages his doesn’t understand, but he’s well-used to having thoughts in his head that he didn’t put there (no matter how little he likes it), and he continues with his mission regardless.

Over the comms he hears the sound of fighting, and suddenly Barton says, sounding lost and confused: “Natasha?” Then there’s a grunt, and nothing more from Barton.

“Barton, come in, do you read me?” James asks, as he rounds a corridor. There’s no reply. “Barton’s down,” he says into the comm.

The men in front of him abruptly stop where they are, raising their weapons as they turn the corner, and James rounds the corner behind them and –

Red. White. And blue. A familiar chin beneath a familiar cowl.

Steve. It’s _Steve_. His brain goes offline.

His men are about to open fire, and James stops them, operating on autopilot.

“Get out of the way,” he tells Captain America.

“Sorry, can’t do that,” the Captain says easily, and James runs forward, pulling out a knife. He slashes at the Captain’s face, aiming to wound rather than kill – somewhere underneath his fierce loyalty to Loki, part of him is damn near screaming in disbelieving joy at Steve’s existence – and his strike is blocked by the Captain’s shield. For the next couple of minutes James and the Captain concentrate on nothing but each other, trying to take the other out.

Then there’s the sound of a gunshot and the Captain gasps, reeling back a little, and James is instantly furious.

“ _Hold your –_ ” he starts, but the lapse in concentration is enough, and something red and white and blue flashes at the corner of his vision with dizzying speed before it slams into the side of his skull.

Darkness.

* * *

When James regains consciousness, he can tell instantly that he’s tied to a chair. His head is lolling forward on his chest, and he has a killer headache. Also, the creepy devotion to Loki is gone. It takes him a moment to remember what happened, but then his eyes shoot open, and he looks around, not daring to hope –

–and there’s Steve, staring at him with a pale face, his mouth a resolute line. They’re not alone, but James doesn’t give a damn.

“ _Steve_ ,” he breathes, feels his face light up in wonder. “ _Steve_.” He feels himself choking up, his eyes stinging with tears, but he can’t stop himself.

Steve makes an aborted movement as though to go to him, but stills it before it’s complete. His expression is conflicted.

“If I could have your attention,” the black guy in the leather coat demands dryly, and James blinks away the tears, breathes deeply, and turns his head to look at him. It’s hard to have any sort of dignity in his current position, but he tries anyway.

“What can I do for you?” James asks.

“For a start, how long have you been working for Loki?” asks a familiar redhead, who James places after a long moment.

“ _Natashenka_ ,” he says in surprise, and the look she gives him is her equivalent of a glare. He blinks, and shakes his head to clear away the sudden influx of memories. “Since he got me with that spear of his,” he says, answering her question. “I was sent to kill him, but he was stronger and faster than I was. Cleared all the programming out of my brain before he got control of me. Said I had no heart, and he needed to fix that.”

He almost shudders at the memory of Loki’s influence seeping into his mind, but he doesn’t. Loki’s mind-control was kinder than anything that HYDRA had ever done to him. He decides to say so.

“Creepy as all hell, but still kinder than what HYDRA did to me.”

Suddenly the silence in the room takes on a charged quality.

“HYDRA?” Steve asks sharply, and James wants to look at him. Instead, he looks at the carpet.

“Yeah. _Oh_ ,” he breathes, as more of his newly-returned memories helpfully surface. “Oh boy, are you in trouble. They’ve infiltrated SHIELD. There from the beginning,” he rambles, the understanding unfolding as he speaks. “Stark was onto them, so they arranged an accident for him. _That_ was why.”

He remembers tampering with the brake lines, of following Stark until he saw the crash. He closes his eyes against the memory, and decides not to mention it.

When he opens his eyes again, the man with the goatee has turned white. James has no trouble tracing the lines of Howard’s features in his face.

“I’m sorry,” he tells what has to be Stark’s kid. “But I had to tell you. You don’t know – there are _so many_ of them. All hiding inside SHIELD. They used to talk about it when I was around, since my memory was about to be wiped anyway.” This time he does shudder, and loses himself for a moment: so many memory wipes, so much _agony._

He’s brought back to reality by a hand on his shoulder, and blinks up wildly into Steve’s face. Steve looks like a house has fallen on him, his expression shattered and stricken, and James understands instinctively.

“It wasn’t your fault,” he tells Steve. “ _Steve._ It _wasn’t_ –”

But the sad, broken look in Steve’s face doesn’t go away, and James sags in his restraints.

“Tell us about Loki,” instructs the black man, although he looks as grim as everyone else.

James tells them everything he can think of.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Bucky's characterisation is dodgy, I'm pretty sure, but I'm excusing it on the basis that after being Winter Soldier, he's going to be a different guy. Might go back and fix up some dialogue after I watch Captain America 1 again._

James is in a cell by himself when suddenly the door opens, and Steve is standing there in full uniform, complete with shield. James blinks up at him.

“What –”

“We’re leaving, and we’re taking you with us,” says Steve, in his Captain voice. He doesn’t define the ‘we,’ but James guesses he means the group that was with him earlier. There are a million reasons why this is a stupid idea, but James gets to his feet anyway, and silently follows Steve through the hallways towards the flight hangar. Halfway there an alarm klaxon goes off and Steve says “Run,” and both of them do.

Steve sprints for one of the planes parked in the hangar and James runs after him, leaping into the plane just as it takes off. He finds himself looking at Steve, and at the Black Widow.

“Not that I don’t appreciate the jail-break, but what the hell?” he asks.

“We’re taking down Loki,” Natasha says briefly. “You in or out?”

They stare at him.

“I go where Steve goes,” James says, before he can even think about it. There’s the sound of an indrawn breath, and the next moment a hand closes on Bucky’s shoulder and he’s being dragged down the plane. Steve shoves him into the lavatory and walks in after him, shutting the door behind them.

“Steve –” James begins, which is when Steve kisses him. James goes with it.

A moment later Steve breaks it off and says fiercely, “ _I thought you were dead._ ” His hands are on James’ shoulders. James manages a smile.

“I thought you were smaller,” he says, and doesn’t yelp as Steve’s fingers dig into his human arm. He waits patiently as Steve searches his eyes, staring back.

Finally Steve sighs, and something about the set of his shoulders relaxes.

“Okay,” Steve decides, and the corner of his mouth tips up in a lopsided smile.

“Okay?” James parrots, and Steve nods.

“Yeah. Okay.”

They leave the lavatory, to find Natasha staring at them. One of her eyebrows rises very slightly, and James knows she’s worked out about him and Steve. James glances at Steve out of the corner of his eyes, but Steve doesn’t say anything, so James doesn’t either.

Steve takes a seat, so James takes a seat next to him. He can feel the heat radiating from Steve’s body. Natasha is watching them.

“So,” says Natasha, “I guess some things about you didn’t make it into the history books.”

Steve looks at her.

“You could say that,” he agrees.

“You know it’s legal, now, right? I mean, the fact that he’s the Winter Soldier is a concern, but it’s perfectly legal for two guys to –”

“I know,” Steve interrupts shortly. “They told me men can get married now, too. It doesn’t matter.”

James blinks, because he’s spent most of the last few decades cryogenically frozen, and he’s missed a lot.

“Wait – when you say men can get married, you mean _to each other?_ ”

Steve and Natasha both look at him. Natasha smiles faintly.

“It’s a brand new world, Soldier,” she tells him.

“Bucky,” Steve corrects firmly, while James is busy feeling stunned. “His name is Bucky.”

“Or James,” James says quickly, because while he doesn’t mind Steve calling him Bucky, he isn’t sure about anyone else. Steve flashes him a look too swift for him to interpret, before looking away again.

James, meanwhile, is mulling over this unexpected news. He’d never really wanted to get married, back before the war – after all, the girls were nice, but he’d never met one he liked well enough to want to settle down with. But if guys are allowed to marry each other, now –

He finds himself looking at Steve, who gives him a quizzical look. James just shrugs, and looks back at Natasha.

“So, does someone want to tell me where we’re headed?” he asks.

“New York,” Natasha answers, handing him a comm. unit. James fits it into his ear. “We think Loki’s commandeered Stark Tower.”

“Right.” James has no idea where Stark Tower is, but he supposes that as long as Steve or Natasha knows how to get there, it doesn’t matter. A thought occurs to him. “Hey, who’s flying this thing?”

“That would be me,” says a familiar voice over the comm. James blinks.

“Barton?” he asks.

“Yeah, it’s me.” Barton’s voice is casual, but James can hear the underlying strain in it. “Natasha rebooted me, kind of like how Captain America rebooted you.”

“Painfully,” James guesses, remembering the moment when Steve’s shield slammed into the side of his head. “You sure you ought to be flying?”

“Hah, I could fly this in my sleep,” Barton retorts easily.

“How about you stay awake for now,” James returns, just as easily, and he hears Steve snort. He glances at Steve, to see him smiling at nothing. The sight is enough to make James smile slightly himself.

“Funny, Barnes,” Barton deadpans, and then there’s silence on his end. James glances at Steve.

“So, I’m guessing we’re going to be in the air awhile,” says James. “Anyone got a pack of cards?”

“In my pocket,” says Barton, “if Natasha wants to come get it.”

Natasha looks at James. James glances at Steve, who shrugs. Both of them look at Natasha expectantly.

“Fine,” says Natasha, getting to her feet. “Who feels like a game of poker?”

“It’ll pass the time, I guess,” says Steve. Natasha heads for the cockpit.

“Captain Boyscout knows how to play poker?” asks a new voice on the comm. “I am shocked, shocked, by this depravity.”

James feels his mouth curl up in a slight smile. He’s smiled more in the past few hours than he has in decades.

“Hate to tell you,” he tells the mysterious new voice, “but I was a boy scout for a while, and all the other kids knew how to play poker.”

“Only because you taught them,” says Steve, grinning. “And then you got thrown out for brawling too often.”

James shrugs, because that’s true.

“Who are you, anyway?” James asks the new voice.

“Tony Stark,” comes the immediate reply. “What, never heard of me?”

“I spent most of the last fifty years cryogenically frozen, give me a break,” James says, glad that neither of them has mentioned Howard Stark.

He hadn’t liked Howard overmuch, but he’d been an alright guy, and to know that he was the one who’d killed him… well, it's unpleasant, and talking to the guy’s kid with that in mind was just plain awkward. Memory pings, and he adds, “Wait. The metal suit guy, that’s you?”

“The metal suit guy. Wow. You make me sound so… downmarket,” says Stark. “Yeah, that’s me. The metal suit guy. Listen, what do we call you on comms? I vote Robocop.”

James thinks about the question for a moment.

“Soldier will do,” he says finally. Steve looks at him with a concerned expression, and James gives him a wry look. “Not like I have any other code name, and I’ll respond to Soldier automatically. Just because the programming’s gone doesn’t mean I don’t still have the instincts.” He taps a metal finger against his temple to emphasise the point.

“But you’re you,” Steve insists. “You’re Bucky.”

“I don’t know about that,” says James, and holds up a hand when Steve opens his mouth to protest. It’s the metal hand, and that shuts Steve up more effectively than the same gesture with the human hand would have. “I’m me, sure, but I’ve been programmed and mind-wiped and forced to do some pretty atrocious things. Steve – I’m not the guy you knew back in Brooklyn, anymore. I’ve still got your back, as much as I can, but I’m not the buddy you left behind. I’m a mess.”

“But you’re _Bucky_ ,” Steve says stubbornly, and James sighs.

“You’re not listening, pal. Sure, I’m Bucky, but I’m not the same man you used to know. I don’t even talk the same, since those bastards got hold of me.”

He doesn’t – his accent’s changed, and his Brooklyn dialect is mostly gone, replaced with a vocabulary that’s both more modern and less localised.

Steve looks distressed, but determined.

“You’re still you,” he says with finality. James gives in.

“Yeah, sure,” he sighs. “I’m still me.”

He’s pretty sure that Steve doesn’t notice the lie. He’s equally sure that Natasha does.


End file.
